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Thursday, August 18, 2011

Shin Chan Season 3 Part 1 Review









ShinChan: Season Three, Part One

$21.99 on Amazon

Move over South Park, Shin Chan will be saying all the things you shouldn't.
Re-dubbed to a point where it would be censored on Adult Swim, Shin Chin is back with a vengeance.

Shin Chan for those out of touch when the show was on Adult Swim or don't have Netfilx streaming is an overdone re-dub about a young boy named Shin who is very strange and ruins everyone's life. His family and friends, teachers and neighbors make up the cast. Shin Chan before the dubbing is considered to be The Simpsons of Japan, except the animation never got better.

Being away for two years has made the writers of Shin-Chan grow mad. Very mad. Insane if you will.
The writers watched some movies and TV and said let's not come up with any fun ideas, let's make fun of Sunshine Cleaning. The remake of Inglorious Bastards was dirty and wrong as an epsidoe, then there were the jokes for True Blood. A vampire after a woman's tampon for a snack was just the start. Blood Stone to X-Men 3 and Manic Cop all are parodied or simply mentioned instead of a better refashioning of episodes.




I'm kind of glad I missed the writer's panel at Anime Expo.I feel like writing from the show has somewhat suffered for going way too far or maybe the writers got lazy. The 2 year hiatus didn't help and not having certain boundaries has allowed episodes to go far out of question.

The animation differs episode to episode from whenever it was plucked to fit the writers needs. That's not what a human head should looks like is what you might spout out of your  mouth when seeing some. The animation and character design are so weird for anime, it's a very uncommon style and the show has been going on for years in Japan so you can see when an episode is older or younger.

One episode made it clear the writers lived in LA, when Shin was going to see Action Bastard in 3D at the Banarama Dome which is the Cinerama Dome here in LA on Sunset.

Another thing about movie references that stood out was they went over a little tibit of Japanese culture. Movies in Japan cost a lot. One episode has Mitzi taking Shin and his friends to the theater. Seeing a Howl's Farting Castle poster was a nice touch. In Japan, there's only one movie theater chain so they can put any prices they want. Special merchandise is available including pamphlets about the films and special collectors cups and such are sold in the lobby, which usually have gift shops. Mitzi has to buy Shin and all his friends a pamphlet at ten bucks each. The movie is extremely short, which isn't lie. I believe in Japan special children's screenings happen and they usually involve more than one feature so you can leave whenever. This means they can be shorter or just play over again for more people to come in and out whenever.

Types of jerks in the theater from people talking on cells to sleeping were revisited in another episode involving the Subway. However this time Shin dealt with them all in unique and annoying ways. It's another stab at Japanese culture and how much the people their have to use public transit.

 A more easy-going revisioning could have sufficed It didn't half to go so far. Just make Shin say more adult things. A new addition to the Nohara household with Bitzi, Mitzi's younger sister could have been funny without her being addicted to cocaine and gun powder, which she calls "brown, brown". These episodes and writing make the show seem so fake and take you out of place that it just doesn't work. Same thing where the kids might be killed by a mutant with fire power, really a metaphor you can see for coach with a lot of energy.

The attempt at making fun of Scientology should have just been about what I can guess was Shin learning English. It's that and other episodes that sort of lessen my joy from the show. The real jokes and humor of Shin Chan is in his family and those who have to put up with Shin, the writers should have worked on that.


Is it funny? Yes, yes and yes, but it's also lazy writing. Shin should go back to what it knows, which is poop jokes.